Class Act: Trailer and Class War Progress Report

Rambles, Theatre

Class Act is a theatre gameshow about class war. It was developed for the Ovalhouse in May 2012, was rebooted for Sprint and Buzzcut in March 2013, and is now ready and hungry and looking for venues for a tour in Spring 2014. This is a wee trailer and progress report from the 2013 edition; you can find blogs from 2012 here.

Trailer

How Audiences Dealt with Class War

Class Act is a rigged gameshow. The audience is divided into three classes and each is given a different seat and a different starting number of sweets. Players can win sweets by playing in games throughout the show, and every round they have to spend sweets in rent to stay in their seats. The gameshow is designed so that the poorest members of the audience are very likely to run out of sweets halfway through, and those comfy seats the upper classes are sitting in start looking very appealing. Different audiences have totally different ways of coping with this:

One particularly firey working class roleplayer led a raid on the stockpile of sweets sitting on the stage, which was the in-game equivalent of knocking off Fort Worth, really. He proceeded to distribute these to the other workers, Robin Hood style, all the while refusing to pay any rent at all.
Rent strikes were a fairly common occurrence. The upper classes usually weren’t bothered — they didn’t need the extra income so much in my very slanted game — but the middle classes frequently got very resentful, as they often kept paying their sweetie mortgages while everyone else was on strike.
It turned out to be quite hard to get the in game police to do anything to put down crime, unless they were given a lot of extra sweets by the upper classes…
Once, two sweet-strapped workers decided to squat the more comfortable upper class seats. They were sent numerous threatening letters, until one member of the upper classes decided to pay them in sweets to work as security guards, looking after the other empty chairs and making sure no one else squatted them.
One landlord set up the Landlord’s Charitable Trust, which began issuing loans to friendly but broke renters in order to keep the property market alive and the entire class system from collapsing.

Review Quotes

The Four Star Officially Affable Review: “And stereotypes (as reinforced by ad men and marketing campaigns) were shot down in gales of laughter in Class Act (****) as the affable Harry Giles provided sweets and serious food for thought by playing games about capitalism and the class system with us. Not every performance reached these heights, but overall there was a lot to enjoy and ponder.” (Mary Brennan, The Herald)

The A Sharp Critique of Modern Mythmaking Review: “And in Albion Street, on Saturday, I saw three contrasting shows, beginning with Harry Giles’s Class Act, a 90-minute “game show” which – like the work of several other young Scottish performance artists – occupies the territory between game show, lecture and political polemic, dividing the audience into three classes, handing out sweeties, quizzing us on what we know about class, and then allowing the economic system to do its worst, in promoting inequality and exploitation.” (Joyce Mcmillan, The Scotsman)

The Yes But Is It Art? Review: “There is an obvious and huge amount of research in this work, which is interesting and educational, yet I find myself questioning the definition of this piece. A teacher once told me that art is the friction between form and feeling. Whilst art is often informed by very technical and in-depth research, it is when a small leap is made into abstraction that it tends to create the biggest impact. Harry uses a powerpoint presentation to guide us through his musings and games, encouraging us to fully understand his findings, and taking Class Act as an educational piece, I was fully engaged. I enjoyed myself and was interested in the subject, but there is something about being spoon-fed information and facts rather than being presented with a space in which I might develop my own thoughts on a subject that seems more informative than artistic.” (Tara Boland, Total Theatre)

How Audiences Dealt With Exploited Labour

One of the gameshow’s games, designed with pal James Pollard, is a simulation of Marxist economics using lego and paper money. There’s a factory, a boss, and a bunch of underpaid workers. The audience is encouraged to invest in the factory, and so everyone is ganging up trying to make the workers build little lego widgets as fast as possible for as little money as possible. This led to some brilliant conflicts:

The most common response was, encouragingly, full strike. Workers had rarely saved up enough money to strike for more than a single round, so success was dependent on a mix of charitable donation, shareholder pressure, and successful haggling. Quite often the outcome of the game was determined by the relative diplomatic skill of the lead union negotiator and the factory boss.
Clever bosses worked out quickly that the most productive workers (those with the most practice of making tiny lego widgets) could be divided from the rest by offering them higher wages. This frequently broke strikes and prevented successful union organising. Another pre-emptive tactic was paying piecework rates, which kept each worker focussed on their own productivity, destroying workplace solidarity.
Some workers discovered that the go-slow protest tactic was more effective than the strike: they got paid, but the boss kept losing money. This was very satisfying.
More satisfying still was the one occasion where a legally-minded worker successfully had the factory shut down for breaching health and safety regulations. (Sharp edges on the lego, or something.) It very nearly succeeded in closing down the whole operation, but the boss managed to bribe the police to reopen the place just in time.
Sadly, the best result of the initial London run never transpired this time round: a full co-operative takeover, where the workers occupy the factory and run it for the collective good. I’m leaving this here as a challenge to future audiences.

Something I Learned About Marketing

I began a highly unscientific study, whereby I told half the potential audience members I pitched the show to that I was “doing a gameshow about class”, and the other half that I was “doing a gameshow about class war”. The latter were 50% more likely to say “Oh… really…”, and the former were 50% more likely to come to the show. I don’t know what this means, and I don’t know if it will change how I pitch the show.

What Audiences Pledged To Do

At the end of the show, the audience is asked if they’d like to pledge to take actions in a class war. The results were:

38 people pledged to hold a reading group about class
23 people pledged to go on the next workers’ rights protest they could
12 people pledged to join the Industrial Workers of the World

I have, as yet, no evidence that any of these pledges have been fulfilled, and thus can confidently declare them as the overall economic impact of the show. And I did join the IWW in the course of making it.

The Total Theatre review above quite rightly points out that these choices are a bit restrictive. Future versions will definitely have a write in slot! I look forward to seeing what folks come up with.

What Happens Next

Attendees and reviewers persist in telling me that this would work well in schools. If any teachers are happy to let me try and get their classes to declare class war, please get in touch.

The show is definitely finished now, after quite a long development period. I love it, and it’s hungry. So! In all seriousness, I’m currently getting in touch with venues around the country to put a spring tour together, with associated workshops wherever they’ll fit. I’d definitely love to hear from you.

Slideshow

25 Ways for Artists to Think About Economics

Poetry, Politics, Rambles, Theatre

I wrote this brain-dump for Andy Field, who was asked to prepare a presentation on “how artists can think about new financial models for themselves and for audiences”. He collected 150 bits of advice, sold them for £1 each, and used the proceeds to pay a violinist to play music for the length of the presentation: hurrah for the meeting of form and content! I keep attempting to write something long and thoughtful on art and money and how it all fits together, or maybe organise a conference about it, or a piece of action-research, or… well, none of that has happened yet. Maybe it will. In the mean time, two very nice people recently reminded me that I’d written this, so I reread it, and it turns out I’d already said most of the things I’ve been thinking about. So here it is. it’s a start, anyway.

“New financial model” does not mean “working for free”. If someone asks you to work for free and gives you nothing in return and pretends it’s a new financial model, tell them to fuck off.

Next time a venue says it will pay you in experience and exposure, ask them if you can buy tickets to their shows with that.

Go read about the Industrial Workers of the World. Start a union.

Read everything that Radical Routes have on the subject of co-ops. Start a co-op.

Go to an organisation in the UK Social Centre Network and ask them how they organise and fund themselves. Work out how this can be apply to an arts organisation. (Many of them are already arts organisations.)

If you’re doing self-promotion well, you’ll probably feel like an arsehole. Ask other people if you are being an arsehole. If they say you aren’t, you’re doing OK.

Raffles are FANTASTIC. Ask someone who grew up in a rural area how to do them well. This is technically an old financial model. Sorry.

If you are working for free for an organisation or event and other people in the organisation or event are getting paid, something may be fucked up. Exploiting labour is one of the oldest financial models there is.

Take assertiveness, confidence, public speaking, or call centre training, and apply everything you’ve learned to negotiations with venues and producers. Don’t worry about your embarrassment, shyness, awkwardness or shame. It is OK to feel these things, but don’t let them stop you. Asking to get paid is part of building a new financial model for the whole arts sector.

Whenever you work with another organisation, ask them if you can have a look at their budget for the project. While reading it, ask yourself if you would spend the money differently. When you’re in their shoes, make sure you do.

Every new financial model has to interact with a lot of really crappy old financial models. A new financial model is not a new world: it is a laboratory in an old world. It is OK if something goes wrong. It is OK if something explodes. This is how we learn.

Start a reading group for Marx’s Capital. Start a reading group for Smith’s Wealth of Nations. Start a reading group for Kropotkin’s Mutual Aid. Have a party.

If you pay less for a Pay-What-You-Can show than for a set price show, why are you paying that much for the set price show?

Experiment with shoplifting. You will learn a lot about how property works.

Next time you throw a house party, ask the guests to pay. Prepare your arguments.

View the writing of economic impact reports as a radical act. Make it so.

Why do you need to make money from your art? Seriously. Make a list of the answers. Think of ways you could meet all those needs without money. Make it so.

Is your labour the same sort of labour as the labour of someone who works in a call centre? Write a list of the reasons it is. Write a list of the reasons it isn’t. Now make it better for both of you. You might already be the same person.

Poetry publishing is subsidised by pay-to-enter poetry competitions. What the fuck is that all about?

There is very little stigma attached to a musician self-publishing their first EP. There is massive stigma attached to a poet self-publishing their first pamphlet. Discuss.

Financial models are the same thing as power models. How money is distributed is determined by how decisions get made. You can’t have a new financial model without also inventing a new decision-making process.

When you pay for art, what are you paying for? (a) The experience; (b) The object; (c) To support the artist; (d) To support the producer; (e) Because you have to; (f) Because you never thought not to; (g) Other (please state).

Here are some things an artist might be: (a) Labourer; (b) Entrepeneur; (c) Community bard; (d) Amateur or hobbyist; (e) Commodity; (f) Self-facilitating media node (arsehole); (g) Social Worker; (h) Scrounger. Which of these do you want to be? Make it so.

If you give money to buskers, do you actually stop to listen?

When somebody brings a bottle of wine to your dinner party, do you feel obligated to pay them, or to bring a bottle of wine when you go round to their house? What does this mean for the way we do art?

Aye But @ National Collective

Poetry, Politics

I’ve a wee thing up now at National Collective, the artists’ faction of the Scottish independence campaign. It’s taken me a long time to get my thoughts properly together on independence, and the only conclusion I could reach was that it wasn’t possible to reach one coherent conclusion. The piece (it might be a poem) is one long plea for a wider, more important debate about what Scotland is and what it’s for.

Aye, but hit’s no as if Scotland wis a nation foondit on onything ither than imperialism n conquest.
Aye, but hit’s no as if gin ye stamp oot the thistles onything ither will growe in thair steid.
Aye, but hit’s no as if aw this wurds n leids for “Scotland” are orbitin onything ither than a gapin black hole, n the anely thing gaun for that singularity is that hit haesna spewit oot as muckle sharn as “Britain” yet.
Aye, but Yes Scotland have gat a haund haudin a bonsai tree on thair website n that gies me the teemin bowk.
Aye, but a resistans foondit on nationalism is an alienatit resistans (cheers Tom).
Aye, but nationalism is empie.
Aye, but patriotism is for scoundrels.
Aye, but fer aw that n aw that (facepaum) votin for a different state daesna equal votin for self-determination
Aye but independens is no the reid peel.

Read the full piece here.